Kent Bush: Tea Party picks Roberts as primary prey

If the filing period closes with only Roberts and Wolf on the ballot, I will owe all of New Hampshire an apology

Kent Bush

I write a lot of columns.

That’s why I have no problem if someone says, ‘I like your columns even though I don’t agree with all of them.”

Trust me, I have a read a few of them and wondered if I had been sleep-deprived in the days leading up to writing them.

One of those is an attack I made on the good people of New Hampshire and their legislature’s attempt to make it law to have “none of the above” as a choice on ballots.

I still question the logic of having it on the ballot but I think I have anew perspective on why they want the choice included after watching the Kansas Senate election begin.

So far, only incumbent Pat Roberts and TEA Party and Senate Conservative Fund backed Dr. Milton Wolf have declared their candidacies for the position.

There are rumors of former Rep. Todd Tiahrt getting in on the Republican side. The Democrats have throw around names like former Governor and Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius and Wichita Mayor Carl Brewer although neither have publicly expressed interest in the campaign.

If the filing period closes with only Roberts and Wolf on the ballot, I will owe all of New Hampshire an apology.

Recent revelations about each man have been less than attractive. Roberts, the 78-year-old who has served 18 years in the Senate has reportedly represented the state without actually owning a home in Kansas for 15 years.

I have reservations about someone finishing a term when they are 84-years-old. But claiming to rent a room from a major donor when you are in the state is not exactly the same as living here.

Wichita Congressman Mike Pompeo flies in and out of Washington D.C. each week. Something tells me his understanding of Kansas and that of Roberts, who is an infrequent guest, are quite different.

But the good doctor from Kansas City is no perfect candidate. I’m sure his rise in the polls and support from the PAC that Texas Senator Ted Cruz helped build to bring more conservatives to the Senate are coincidental to the “discovery” of Facebook posts by Dr. Wolf from several years ago.

A radiologist, Dr. Wolf was not above posting graphic radiology images of gunshot wounds or other serious or fatal injuries on his Facebook page with pithy comments underneath.

“From my residency days... there was a pretty active 'knife and gun club' at Truman Medical Center. What kind of gun blows someone's head completely off? I gotta get me one of those,” Wolf said in one comment.

Come on! This is Kansas.

Wolf was just showing that he supports the Second Amendment. He probably just wanted to blow the head off of a deer or protect himself from communists or something.

He also posted X-rays from another patient and added, “It reminds (me) of the scene from Terminator 2 when they shoot the liquid metal terminator guy in the face at close range and it kind of splits him open temporarily almost like a flower blooming. We all find beauty in different things."

Look at the tolerance he displays. He understands that one mans Picasso is another man’s exploded cranium. No wonder his website says you should elect him if you want to drive President Barack Obama crazy. He would probably show him images of dead people all day.

But Wolf says those days are in his past. In a prepared statement, he said, “Several years ago I made some comments about these images that were insensitive to the seriousness of what the images revealed. Soon thereafter, I removed those images and comments, again several years ago.”

I’m sure he is a new man now.

Wolf blamed the Roberts campaign for releasing these posts to the press. That would be shocking, wouldn’t it?

He also said Roberts was vilifying all doctors by saying these things.

To me, it seems like Roberts’ campaign is only vilifying those doctors who find humor in the death of shooting victims and post it for everyone to see.

I don’t think that is “all doctors” by any estimation.

This is part of the strange game the TEA Party has played since it was created in 2010. Moderate establishment Republicans are the primary prey. If not for Dr. Wolf, Roberts would have no problem getting re-elected in the reddest state in the nation. But if Wolf were to knock off Roberts from the right, that would be the best chance Democrats have had in decades to win a seat in the Senate.

See Nevada and Delaware as evidence in this case.

Wolf might be a better candidate than Christine O’Donnell and Sharron Angle but these Facebook posts are the first torpedoes launched by his opposition.

Hopefully, Kansas voters won’t be left with only these choices when the final ballot is printed.

Kent Bush is the publisher of the Butler County Times Gazette and can be reached at: kbush@butlercountytimesgazette.com